Once Works Well was pure technology. Now it seeks merely to divert.Pansy subjects - Verse! Opera! Domestic trivia! - are now commonplace. The 300-word limit for posts is retained. The ego is enlarged

Thursday, 31 July 2008

One reason why I blog

I’ve touched on technology and aesthetics before but clumsily, not getting to the heart of the matter.

Take a power drill. One can enclose the works in a multicoloured, smoothly shaped plastic shell making it prettier. But that’s simply giving a doll a new set of clothes. What I’m struggling for is something that looks good because of what it does.

My poor old metalworking vice – not used much these days as you can see – is, of course, required to hold workpieces securely. More interestingly, it must be designed so that I may get to any oddly shaped workpiece with a saw, a drill, a file and so on. To ensure this accessibility unnecessary metal is removed from the vice jaws.

As a result both jaws emerge from curving neck-like structures. The shape of these structures is functional but pleasing. The curves are there because those type of curves work best. And that premise is often a useful definition of beauty in other unassumingly attractive objects.